A drug shown to be more effective than the previous “gold standard” treatment for early-stage breast cancer sufferers becomes available to patients.
Anastrozole, which is marketed as Arimidex, substantially reduces the risk of the disease returning or spreading and gives better disease-free survival rates than tamoxifen. It also has fewer side effects.
But there is a price: treatment will cost about ?1,000 a year, compared with the ?20 to ?30 for tamoxifen, and will add tens of millions of pounds to the health service bill.